


Let's Say I'm Learning

by Sidney Sussex (SidneySussex)



Category: The Avengers (2012)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-09-21
Updated: 2012-09-21
Packaged: 2017-11-14 18:28:32
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 33
Words: 14,727
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/518219
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SidneySussex/pseuds/Sidney%20Sussex
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A series of unconnected moments from the lives of Clint Barton and Phil Coulson.  Originally written for <a href="http://fuckyeahclintcoulson.tumblr.com/">Fuck Yeah Clint/Coulson</a> and now, due to coercion <a href="http://archiveofourown.org/users/lucdarling">from</a> <a href="http://archiveofourown.org/users/Huzzah/pseuds/Tigs">some</a> <a href="http://archiveofourown.org/users/lanyon">wonderful</a> <a href="http://archiveofourown.org/users/gilesfarnaby">people</a>, posted together here.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> _I neither own nor profit from any of these characters; they are the property of Marvel Entertainment, LLC._
> 
> _If you see something that you think ought to be changed or improved, please feel free to let me know, if you'd like. Constructive criticism is always welcome. (And yeah, I totally mix and mash up the comics and the movie 'verse, and play around with timelines a little. Sorry.)_
> 
> There will almost certainly be more of these at some point. I have no idea when, or what they'll be, but every so often... things... happen.

Waking up to Phil is Clint's favourite thing.

He'd never tell anyone that, least of all Phil, and it usually doesn't matter anyway because he wakes up about five minutes before their eight o'clock briefings, throws himself through the shower at light speed, and shows up just as Phil is beginning to talk, dishevelled and with his hair in total disarray and not caring at all because he's sure as hell not giving up his precious sleeping hours to try to look presentable for the Avengers. Phil, on the other hand, is up by six every morning, assembling his sidearm and combing his hair and straightening his tie and just generally being _Phil_. So the number of times in any given week that Clint actually gets to wake up beside him is somewhere between zero and if-you're-very-very-lucky.

But sometimes he _is_ very, very lucky and it will be a Sunday morning and everyone else will have been out late the previous night at one of Tony's parties or one of Bruce's lectures (and holy hell, those physicists can _drink_ ) or even at Clint's favourite lowlife bar in Manhattan, and the house will be quiet later than usual, and Clint will have fallen into bed half-undressed with his bracer still on his right arm, and when he wakes up, Phil will be right there next to him, smoothing his hair back with one hand and just _looking_ at him with those calm, clear eyes.

And every time he does it, Clint can't remember ever having been so happy in his life.


	2. Chapter 2

Clint wields coffee like it's a blunt weapon, cramming as many grounds into the coffee maker as will fit, running superheated water through them in the mornings because no coffee maker of Tony Stark's would ever consider settling for ordinary water. He brews it pitch-thick and pitch-black, caffeine paste in a cup, and he and Tony drink it that way while they're pretending to pay attention to their morning briefings. Everyone else has tried it once, except Bruce because Tony's afraid it'll trigger a transformation, but nobody else has ever tried it _more_ than once.

Phil refuses to call it 'coffee' at all. His usual name for what Clint makes is something along the lines of 'don't-bring-that-cup-anywhere-near-me,' or, if he's feeling particularly generous at the time, 'that sludge of yours.' Phil buys special coffee with a Portuguese name from a tiny town in Brazil, and there isn't a superhero on the team who dares to go anywhere near Phil's coffee, because he _knows_ , he _always_ knows, he can tell if you've been near it or breathed on it or even _looked_ at it funny. He buys it green and roasts it himself, in a black-and-silver gadget that Tony once offered to upgrade and, in return, got a look so harsh he swears it made his arc reactor flicker.

Nobody touches Phil's coffee.

Personally, Clint can't tell the difference, but that might be because he's so used to his own style of almost-worthy-of-the-name-coffee that his taste buds are destroyed, or at least, that's what Phil keeps telling him. Or it might be because when he drinks coffee, he's never awake enough to really register what it tastes like, which is _why_ he drinks it in the first place. Or it might be because he's only ever tasted Phil's coffee by proxy, on his lips and tongue when they kiss, on his breath when they hold each other close and just spend a moment being together while the rest of the world revolves around them, drinking whatever coffee they want, because Clint and Phil don't care.


	3. Chapter 3

It's usually Phil who's up late, sitting in front of his computer or a pile of unwelcome paperwork, staring at it late into the night by the light of the lone desk lamp in his office. Clint would never admit it, but it's hard for him to get to sleep without Phil beside him, so he invents things to do for as long as he can (there's nothing wrong with extra target practice, and if Tony isn't busy in his workshop he's always ready to spar for a little while), and then he goes to Phil's office and sits in the corner, as quietly as he can, so that he doesn't disturb anything. Sometimes he reads, and Phil's always surprised by Clint's taste in books, because he expects Clint to be kind of a Tom Clancy man, and he's not. Clint likes reading Tolkien and Shakespeare, and Phil is sworn to silence about it. Not even the usual stoic S.H.I.E.L.D. kind of silence, either; this is the real deal, top-secret, kill-you-in-your-sleep kind of silence. And inevitably, Clint will fall asleep there in the corner of Phil's office, head resting on the wall behind him, and Phil will see it and take pity on him and come to bed, whether he's done with his work for the day or not.

Every so often, though, it's Clint who's burning the midnight oil, usually down at the firing range alone. He never talks about the nightmares, and Phil never asks; they don't come very often, but the night after he has one, he's always down there with a full quiver of arrows, and he shoots and he shoots and he tries not to focus on anything else, and sometimes it even almost works. And eventually, his fingers go numb and stiff and he's just shooting without even thinking about it, and Phil will come down the stairs and gently lift his fingers off the bowstring and fold them into his hands, and when he has to do that, he _knows_ Clint is upset, so they just stand there until Clint calms down enough that Phil can wrap him in his arms and brush his lips across Clint's forehead and promise that tonight will be better.

They both know that Phil can't promise anything like that, but he does anyway, and it's never failed yet.


	4. Chapter 4

Working for S.H.I.E.L.D. sends Phil all over the country, and sometimes even farther, though Clint isn't sure he entirely believes everything Thor claims about the Bifröst and the Nine Worlds and the brave Son of Coul's travels through them. But sometimes Clint gets home from an Avengers mission or a S.H.I.E.L.D. assignment or a trip to this really awesome hot dog vendor in Central Park and one of the Quinjets is missing (and it's not Tony who's taken it, Tony always takes the private jet with the pretty flight attendants), so Clint can pretty much guess that he's not going to find Phil in his office.

A lot of the time, Phil has to go pretty much incommunicado when he's away from headquarters, and Clint's used to that. It used to bother him just a little – not because he thought it was Phil's fault; in fact, he used to get pretty pissed off at Director Fury because if Phil couldn't talk to them _how was Clint going to know if something had happened to him_ – but ever since accompanying him to New Mexico for Thor's hammer, which Phil says was a low-hazard-level mission, he understands that it's often not practical for Phil to be trying to touch base with them while he's working.

Phil still remembers that it used to bother Clint, though, and so whenever he can (which is not often), he checks in with Clint late at night in his office via webcam. Clint always feels weird sitting in Phil's office without the other man's physical presence, but it's the best they can do, and his hand curls protectively around the mouse as if by holding it tightly he can keep some kind of grip on Phil, keep him safe from whatever threat he's dealing with right now.

Clint hates that he can't keep Phil safe while he's away, and Phil just smiles at him from the computer monitor and tells him that now he knows how Phil feels when he's out on assignment.


	5. Chapter 5

Clint comes back injured a lot. Phil is used to it by now, keeps a complete emergency first aid kit in his office instead of the little canvas one every S.H.I.E.L.D. agent is issued, because he knows that Clint will come to him first, instead of going to the infirmary. He also knows that it's not even worth his time to suggest the infirmary because Clint will acquiesce and leave and Phil will find him, hours later, asleep on the floor of his room, and there will be no record of his ever having gone for medical attention. So he keeps his own supplies, and he's gotten pretty good at patching up and bandaging and examining and – on more than one memorable occasion – stitching up lacerations that Clint deems 'just a scratch' and Hank deems 'oh, my God, Barton, why the hell didn't you get that seen to?'

Clint walks into his office half-dead all the time, so he's learned to keep calm and just take it in stride, and one injury blurs into the next and when it's dark and they're in bed and Phil is gently feeling out each battle scar with his fingers and lips and tongue, he can't even remember anymore where they all come from.

But the day neither of them will ever forget is the day Phil walks into his own office with one hand in his hair, trying to stop the blood from pouring out over his face by soaking up as much of it as possible with the tattered remnants of one shirtsleeve. And Clint, who's been in there for the last hour waiting for Phil to get back from San Juan, leaps up to greet him and all the colour just drains from his face like he's the one who's losing all his blood, like he's just seen one of his worst nightmares come true, and Phil sways and Clint catches him before he hits the ground. Clint's talking, doesn't even know what he's saying but Phil remembers it all, steady stream of curses and reassurances and things that don't make any sense at all, and all the while Clint is wiping away the blood and cleaning the cut and slapping on far too many butterfly strips, the words never stop.

And Clint says, I think you need to go to the infirmary, and Phil asks him if he has any idea how much paperwork that will make for him – which of course he doesn't, but Clint, who can hit a precision bulls-eye from hundreds of feet away, who can fletch a half-inch-long dart without a magnifying glass, who can restring a bow in less than twenty seconds, doesn't dare to get anywhere near Phil's head with a needle and he _needs_ stitches, that much is obvious.

So Clint helps him down to the infirmary, one arm strong around Phil's waist, and even though Phil has to give him directions because he's never even been down there, he doesn't leave the whole time the med techs are fixing up his shoddy bandage job and giving Phil proper medical care. And he doesn't leave afterward, either, helps Phil back up to his room and says if he catches Phil trying to get up and go back to work he's going to take drastic action.

Phil does as he's told, goes to sleep, and wakes up later that evening when Clint slides in beside him, all warm skin and tousled hair and calloused hands. He curls into Clint's arms and falls asleep again to the sensation of soft breathing on his neck, and in the morning, when he gets up and fights off the inevitable headache with the strongest cup of coffee he's ever brewed, he finds out that all of the paperwork has been filled out already in Clint's rough, blocky handwriting.


	6. Chapter 6

The first time Phil and Clint are on assignment together is also the first time Clint manages to break Phil's stoic façade.

They're in an abandoned aircraft hangar Clint would swear is big enough to house the heli-carrier or at least an entire fleet of the Mi-24s that are Nick Fury's favourite service helicopters. Clint is stationed up in the rafters at the far end, not exactly where he was told to be, but after all, he's the one who's up there with a bow and very little cover and he thinks that probably entitles him to be a little choosy about where he hides. Phil is… somewhere; Clint, despite the 'Hawkeye' nickname, has no idea where his colleague is or even if he's still in the warehouse. Phil is too goddamn quiet. It's unsettling.

Clint sits still and motionless in his perch for the first fourteen hours. After that, he shifts from his right knee to his left and holds for another eight hours. And after _that_ , he's really freaking bored, and even though he _could_ keep this up pretty much indefinitely – it's his job, after all – it's more fun to flip to the private channel on the radio and start feeding Phil spoilers for his favourite TV shows.

Actually, it turns out to be no fun at all, because Phil maintains their mandated radio silence. Needling him is only entertaining if Clint gets a response.

So he switches to horrible puns, and after about ten minutes, he hears the tell-tale click and hiss of the channel opening so that Phil can remind him of exactly what the term 'radio silence' means.

Four more hours pass, and then suddenly, _finally_ , there's someone there, and Clint gets to do a lot of shooting in a very short time, so that's all right and it keeps him occupied for a few minutes. And then there are zip ties around wrists and a bomb that Clint isn't allowed to shoot (Phil does something with a little Stark Industries gadget instead) and a long car ride back to base, and all the way there Clint's in the passenger seat arguing with Tony Stark over the radio about building him an arrow that isn't so goddamn _boring_ , seriously, _enough_ with the explosions already, can't Tony build something with a freeze ray or a dimensional portal or a freaking chocolate fountain in it or something? And Tony kind of splutters for a while because it takes him a minute or two to work up to the level of indignant that's required for Clint's _not liking the exploding arrows_ , and Phil, who is Fury's officially designated Deal With Tony Stark employee, just sits in the back seat and laughs quietly to himself, and Clint doesn't look back at him even once.

As they're getting out of the car, though, he brushes past Phil close enough to mutter, I told you I could make you crack a smile.

Phil doesn't react, not at all, because he won't give Clint the satisfaction twice, but he makes a note to himself to request Agent Barton's assistance when he needs a designated marksman from now on.


	7. Chapter 7

Every so often, the Avengers have a movie night. It's something they try to do fairly often, because it doesn't take up a lot of time, they can do it even if they're injured, there's a pause button if someone decides to blow up New York in the middle of it, and it lets Steve and Phil use a lot of words like 'team-building' and 'group dynamics.'

They take turns choosing the movies they watch, and most of the time, they're all pretty predictable. Steve likes classics, Bruce always chooses deep, cerebral sci-fi, and Tony alternates between movies with lots of computers and movies with lots of girls (and no matter which he picks, Clint snickers and calls it his 'porn'). Jan and Natasha both go for martial arts movies, the more fighting the better because they're constantly trying to one-up one another in the kicks-and-punches department, so Quentin Tarantino and Park Chan-wook are heavily favoured on the weeks when those two choose. Wanda claims that she doesn't make a choice at all and merely goes with what the group would have chosen, and Pietro never sits still for the movie anyway so he forfeits his turns.

As far as they all know, Clint and Phil are predictable, too. Clint's choices are basically two-hour-long explosions with no plot to speak of, and Phil's choices always make everyone groan, because he likes Shakespeare adaptations, foreign films and anything by Kenneth Branagh. Or so everyone thinks.

The truth is, Clint claims he has a reputation to uphold. He's the team's handy precision marksman, not a leader, not a strategist, not anything that involves thinking too hard. He's a soldier and a strong, silent observer, and most of all, he's a _man's man_ , and that means movies like _Rambo_ and _Terminator_ and _Lethal Weapon_ and _Die Hard_. So on nights when it's Clint's choice, that's what they watch.

No one ever needs to know that Phil and Clint have secretly traded turns.


	8. Chapter 8

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  **Trigger warning:** references to past physical abuse.

There is a network of scars across Clint's back, and they are not from missions.

They never speak about it, and Phil has never mentioned them, not once. He's never asked about where they come from, he's never asked how they were put there, he's never even hinted to Clint that he knows they aren't the result of fistfights and shrapnel and the thousand other hazards that comprise their daily life.

Clint's history is on file with S.H.I.E.L.D., of course. Officially, it's so highly classified that only Fury has access, but this is _Clint_ and Phil's not going to let a security code stop him, so he's read every word of that file, and several others as well. Files that have records on Clint's mother and father; files detailing time spent in orphanages, working for circuses, freelancing; files on his mentors, on his brother; files that tell Phil how, over and over again, everyone Clint has ever loved has tried to destroy him.

Phil pretends not to know any of it.

He pretends not to notice when Clint slips into the kitchen in the mornings for coffee and bagels, staying long enough to fling about a few sarcastic remarks, but leaving before it looks like he's trying to be a part of any kind of team camaraderie. He pretends not to understand when Clint stands on rooftops, overseeing their battles and taking out anything that threatens to hurt his teammates without ever truly feeling like he belongs in the fight. He pretends not to ache helplessly when everyone goes out after a successful mission and Clint sits on the edge of their celebrations and never quite joins in, and he pretends the well-hidden shadows in Clint's eyes don't break his heart at all.

Phil knows Clint doesn't have to stay on the outside looking in, but lifelong fears are difficult to overcome.

He never says anything, but every time his fingers brush across the marred skin, he swears privately to himself that Clint will never, ever have to be afraid of loving anyone again.


	9. Chapter 9

Phil is a man who uses words sparingly.

Clint is a man who never shuts up.

Phil is a man who conveys intensity in his silences, speaks a thousand words with a single gesture, gives Clint a lifetime's worth of meaning with every look and every touch.

Clint is a man who says absolutely everything that comes into his head, which more often than not gets him into deep trouble, but which Phil secretly loves, because he knows that as long as Clint is still talking, everything's okay.

It's a surprise to both of them, then, when they're in bed and Clint is holding forth on everything he hates about bureaucracy and Tony Stark and Doombots, and Phil puts his hand over Clint's mouth and just leaves it there until Clint stops talking.

They stare at each other in surprise for a moment, and then Phil takes his hand away, presses a kiss to the corner of Clint's mouth and says, I love you.

Clint's silent for so long that Phil is starting to get really worried, and he's about to tell Clint it's okay, he doesn't have to answer, he can just keep talking about the Doombots, but before he manages to get the words out, Clint is there, kissing him fiercely, and Phil knows that that's all the answer he needs.

Some things are too big for even Clint to put into words.


	10. Chapter 10

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  **Spoiler alert:** minor references to events in _Hawkeye: Blindspot_.

Phil doesn't like Russia.

Whenever the team has to travel out of the country, Clint always sends Phil a stupid postcard. He goes out of his way to find the cheesiest imaginable 'wish you were here' landscapes and sunsets, writes dumb, generic holidaymaker sentiments on them, and mails them to Phil unsigned, care of S.H.I.E.L.D.

Phil has never gotten a postcard from Russia, and Clint has been there three times.

The first time, he took a bullet from a programmed assassin and was placed on forced recovery for six weeks, half of which he spent still, pale and silent in the infirmary, half of which he spent limping around the base restlessly, cracking terrible James Bond jokes until they gave in and put him back to work. The second time, he was held hostage for days and finally rescued by airlift courtesy of Stark Industries; Phil knows there was torture, but Clint has never told him exactly what happened. The third time, he came back with a mild concussion that developed into occipital blindness and would have spelled the end of his career if not for one long-shot, last-chance experimental medical procedure.

Clint swears that next time he goes to Russia, he's going to mail Phil's postcard _before_ he starts getting into trouble, which Phil thinks pretty much sums up exactly what's wrong with Russia in the first place, because it's not _if_ Clint gets into trouble, but _when_.

It's not like he can stop Clint from going, but Phil will be very surprised if the stack of postcards in his top desk drawer ever includes one from Russia.

Phil really doesn't like Russia.


	11. Chapter 11

Clint's not authorized to be away from headquarters.

That probably shouldn't be the first thing Phil thinks of to say to him. Probably, the first thing should be _it's three o'clock in the morning_ or _how do you know where I live?_ or _why isn't my alarm system going off?_ But no, all he can think of is, _I'm going to have to report this to Fury in the morning_.

Clint just smirks at him and says, I got bored.

He isn't supposed to be bored. He's supposed to be _asleep_.

Clint acquiesces with a shrug, shucks off his shirt and jeans, and crawls into Phil's bed. Which is so very much _not_ what Phil meant that he's struck speechless for a moment, and Clint's already wrapped around him, breath ruffling his hair, hands warm on his skin, before he can say anything.

He tries to send Clint back to base. He really tries. But he's so _comfortable_ , and Clint is already half-asleep, and so is Phil, and getting him back to base would mean going out in the cold nighttime air and driving the car and putting on pants and other things Phil really, really doesn't want to do right now, and then he'd have to make up some excuse for Fury as to why he was transporting a half-dressed subordinate in the middle of the night, and in the end it's easiest just to wrap Clint's arms tighter around himself and go to sleep.

There are a _lot_ of things he has to explain to Director Fury in the morning.

He doesn't mind at all.


	12. Chapter 12

No one impresses Clint like Phil does.

Phil is a man in a suit at a desk, filing papers and overseeing operations for the Avengers Initiative. Or at least, that's what everybody sees when they look at him. Putting up with a ragtag band of mouthy superheroes would be enough to daunt anyone (and as far as 'mouthy' goes, Clint knows he's the worst of the lot), but that's just the veneer Phil puts on when he goes to work. Clint's seen the old, dusty-tan fatigues; he's found the faded green beret; he's sparred with Phil and lost, time and again. The neatly-pressed black suits are not quite a lie; they're just a way to hide a truth that Phil would rather not see told.

Clint can't imagine why someone so quietly, staggeringly competent as Phil would want someone like _him_. Why an honest-to-God undercover goddamn _hero_ would be interested in a smart-assed, disrespectful archer who's only on the team at all because of a freak stroke of luck. He doesn't know what Phil sees in him.

He doesn't know that when Phil looks at him, he sees a man who's been knocked down by life at every opportunity, but who always gets up again. He sees a man who has almost nothing, but still takes everything he has and every minute of his time to fight for what's right. He sees a man, perfectly ordinary (although anything _but_ ), who takes up his bow next to a team of superheroes and _holds his own_. Phil is pretty sure there isn't anyone else in the world like Clint.

No one impresses Phil like Clint does.


	13. Chapter 13

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  **Trigger warning:** implied violence and gore.

Phil has been working for S.H.I.E.L.D. for five years, nine months and eleven days, ever since the division was formed. He has been assigned to the Avengers Initiative for three years, seven months and twenty-three days, ever since Tony Stark decided to tell the world that he was Iron Man. He has seen accidents and grievous injuries; he has seen torture and agony; he has seen people, good people and bad, enemies and colleagues and close friends, die. Phil is painfully, intimately, familiar with death.

The day he goes out on assignment to the underwater HYDRA base that they've just discovered at the bottom of the New York Harbour, though, is different. He's gone for hours, which is the first red flag because Phil never goes on missions alone unless they're quick cleanup jobs where all that matters is how quickly he can disarm whoever or whatever he finds there. He maintains radio silence the whole time, which is the second red flag, because he's under explicit orders to keep an open comms channel while he's there, and Phil doesn't break orders.

The third red flag isn't really a red flag, it's more of a giant red flashing light with klaxon horns and sirens and probably some kind of special Stark electronic alarm, because it's practically midnight and Phil comes striding in through the front door of the mansion, covered in blood and something else no one really wants to identify, and the look on his face is cold and closed-off and deadly.

Steve finds Clint in the gym working on a set of shoulder exercises, and all he says is, You'd better get up there quickly.

Phil is sitting in his office, staring blankly ahead of him into the distance, and he doesn't react when Clint walks inside without waiting for permission, steps around the desk, and closes his hands around Phil's shoulders. He doesn't resist when Clint stands him up and guides him back to his bedroom, or when Clint gently strips the bloodied clothing from his body. Clint gets him into the shower, runs the water hot until it's coming off clear instead of tinted pink, fragments of brain and bone vanishing down the drain unnoticed. They don't say a word.

Clint will never ask what happened to Phil in the HYDRA base. He knows Phil will never talk about it either. There will never be a field report filed for this mission, and if anyone ever implies that there was once a HYDRA base in New York Harbour, they'll be told to stop talking crap and get back to work. Because for all intents and purposes, this night never happened, and if Fury doesn't lock it down in levels of 'classified' most people don't even know exist, Clint will.

Tomorrow, though.

Tonight, he wraps himself around Phil, holds him close, and gives him permission to forget his assignment, permission to forgive himself for whatever he might have done, permission to sleep, wake up, and still be human in the morning.


	14. Chapter 14

Phil is a damn good marksman. He went forty for forty in his marksmanship exam and pulled off Complete Record Fire while masked and without NVDs at night. And he did it all in a suit and tie.

Phil Coulson is a _damn_ good marksman.

But what he can't do, because it's never been a part of his training, is use a bow and arrow. And that's just ridiculous, or at least Clint _says_ it's ridiculous, which is why Phil is standing beside him at the firing range holding the lightest, most fragile piece of carbon fibre he has ever felt. He's followed all of Clint's instructions for preparing, even picking up a bracer and a finger tab from the armoury for safety. None of which explains why Clint is laughing so hard he can barely catch his breath, clutching his ribs and wiping mock tears from his eyes.

Apparently, you don't dress for archery the same way you dress for marksmanship.

Once Clint has pulled off almost all of Phil's standard protective gear, including some parts that are absolutely, completely, no-exceptions-whatsoever mandatory at the range, he holds up his own bow and fires off a few quick shots, demonstrating flight paths.

Phil's a quick learner, but even so, his first arrow just barely skims the target.

Clint reaches out, takes hold of the bow and turns it slightly in his hand, tilting it up and frowning at Phil's stance before shaking his head. Phil nearly drops the bow entirely when Clint's arms slip around him from behind, one hand coming to rest on his left elbow, tipping his arm up, the other gripping his right forearm and turning his hand inward.

They fire the next arrow together, Clint's fingers closing lightly over Phil's, their shoulders bumping as the bowstring snaps. Clint's jubilant yell when the arrow goes straight into the yellow ring – the _outside_ yellow ring, sure, but _still_ – startles Phil, but the quick kiss he gets startles him even more.

Clint tells him to line up another shot, and he must be rubbing off on Phil, because Phil's only response is to ask if Clint's going to reward him like that again if he makes it.

We'll see where your arrow ends up, Clint tells him, and no one will ever be able to say Phil can't deliver when the stakes are high, because this time the shot lands dead centre in the inner ten.

Clint just stares at him for a moment. Phil looks back, one eyebrow raised, a tiny grin tugging at the corner of his mouth.

It's a very short archery lesson.


	15. Chapter 15

_New Year's Eve, 2011_

Clint's on the top floor of the mansion, staring out of a floor-to-ceiling window. There are tourists on the street below, picking their way across the thin layer of snow that's fallen since last night. He knows they're tourists because they're way over-dressed for a New York City winter, and because five minutes ago they had their cell phones out to snap pictures of Avengers headquarters.

He hates New Year's.

That's why they're here, of course, that's why everyone's here, because it's the last day of the year and everyone within travelling distance of New York has come to party on Times Square. Except the New Yorkers, of course, who'd rather fight the Red Skull bare-handed than try to go out into the city on _this_ night.

He hates Manhattan, too. There are so many fantastic vantage points and so many idiots on the street, and he's not allowed to shoot _any_ of them.

What's the point of New Year's, anyway? he wonders, watching more excited faces pass below him on the street. So they've survived another year and he's going to have to remember to write '2012' on his field reports from now on. What's so great about that?

He knows he's kind of got an attitude about it. He knows he should relax; knows most people just like to celebrate and reminisce and spend the time with friends – but that's _why_ he feels the way he does about the whole thing. There's never been anything in his life he _wants_ to reminisce about, nothing worth celebrating, no one who's ever made the choice to spend the time with him.

He hates New Year's.

The windowpane in front of him fogs up and he turns, because he came up here to be alone and even though he's in an open room, it feels kind of like an intrusion that someone's here beside him.

Phil Coulson's standing a few feet away, gazing through the window at the footsteps in the snow.

"You know," Coulson says mildly, without looking up, "I never got the point of New Year's."

Tony hosts a party that evening at the mansion, and of course, all of the Avengers are invited. Clint thinks about going, he really does, but he hates New Year's and he hates the glitter and glamour of Tony's world and he hates that this is a big deal for everyone but him.

He's in his quarters with a box of stolen tranquilizer darts, throwing them at a group shot of the X-Men he's got pinned to his wall, when there's a soft knock at the door, and Phil Coulson's out there, tie loose and shirtsleeves rolled up.

Clint says, "I hate New Year's."

Coulson says, "Sounds good to me."

It turns out Coulson is a pretty good shot with the darts, too.

* * *

_New Year's Eve 2012_

Clint's back up on the top floor of the mansion where he was a year ago, staring out of the same window. There are still tourists; there are still slushy remnants of snow crushed by a thousand footsteps; there are still old Christmas decorations hanging from the lampposts like some long-forgotten reminder of celebrations past.

It's New Year's, and he wants to hate it.

He doesn't want to celebrate. He doesn't do nostalgia. He doesn't want to spend the evening getting drunk with the other Avengers. It's _New Year's_ , and Clint Barton hates New Year's.

The problem, though, is the warm weight of Phil's arm around him, the soft mist of their matched breathing on the glass. The problem is the Thermos of hot chocolate on the floor beside them, Phil's mother's secret recipe; the problem is the dartboard on the wall, newly covered with snapshots of the X-Men, and the set of purple-and-blue darts Phil's bought to go along with it. The problem is the feel of a gentle hand on his shoulder, the soft kisses Phil drops into his hair when he's not looking.

The problem is that Clint _does_ want to celebrate this thing they have, he _does_ want to reminisce about the year they've spent together and look forward to whatever happens next.

The problem is that by being here together, Clint and Phil have somehow ended up hating New Year's in a way that looks suspiciously like not hating it at all.

"I still hate New Year's, you know," Clint grumbles as he leans into Phil.

"I know," comes the quiet reply. Phil kisses him. "Me, too."


	16. Chapter 16

Phil didn't think they'd last a week without anyone finding out about them.

It's not that their relationship is a secret or anything. Phil wouldn't stand for that, not subterfuge, not at S.H.I.E.L.D. But they've agreed to be… discreet, at least, and when they did, Phil wasn't honestly sure Clint quite knew the meaning of the word. He'd thought they might manage a few days before a suggestive comment, an unsubtle glance, a careless gesture after a mission, and then the questions would start.

It's been weeks, though, more than weeks, and Clint hasn't slipped up once. It's the opposite, in fact. When the others are around, Clint's expression grows quiet and focused, his eyes serious the way they are when he's on the shooting range and Phil is only watching through the cameras. He's handling this carefully, like their relationship is something he can drop and shatter, like it's going to come apart if he doesn't get this exactly right.

That wasn't what Phil meant when he said he thought they should exhibit some restraint in their personal involvement. All he meant was that perhaps cracking inappropriate sex jokes in front of Director Fury might not be the most judicious way to go about things. But he's said it wrong, he's miscalculated a little, because he recognizes what it looks like when Clint is scared, and he's scared now. Scared that by just being himself, his ridiculous, smart-assed, impetuous self, he might mess up something that _matters_.

And that's not fair, and that's not right.

Phil would like to think that there's at least some kind of rational thought process driving him at all times, but the truth is, when he grabs Clint and kisses him in the rec room in front of half the team, the only thing going through his head is that he wants this, and Clint wants this, and what else really matters anyway?


	17. Chapter 17

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  **Trigger warning:** references to past physical/emotional abuse.

Sometimes, after Clint is asleep, Phil runs gentle fingers through his hair and thinks, I wish I knew how your brain works.

Most of the time, it's fine. They talk, they laugh, they argue, and Clint coaxes slow, easy smiles from Phil and counts each one as a victory. Clint's grins are quick and ready, always just under the surface, waiting for the next joke or the next sly comment or the next deceptively innocent phrase. That's fine, and that's more of Clint Barton than the rest of the world ever sees, and Phil feels privileged to have it.

But sometimes, the smile doesn't reach Clint's eyes. Sometimes, he pulls gently away from Phil's arms around him. Sometimes, Phil asks him what's wrong or tells him he loves him and Clint can't find the words to answer, just avoids Phil's gaze and sits alone on the far edge of the bed. It's not a large bed, S.H.I.E.L.D. standard-issue, and even without moving, Phil could reach out and touch Clint. But on days when he's like this, Phil knows that even if he did, he wouldn't be bridging the distance between them. He wants to, but Clint is too far away for him.

Phil knows Clint has issues. He knows that even though Clint's always smiling for the team, he's not accustomed to real happiness. He knows that even though Clint lets himself be clapped on the shoulder, patted on the back, held close, he's not accustomed to a touch that isn't meant to hurt. He knows that even though Clint knows what it means to say _I love you_ , and it's a gift he gives to Phil all the time, he's not accustomed to hearing those words said to _him_ , and he's still never quite sure he can believe them.

If Phil ever gets any of the people from Clint's past in his sights, God help them, because no force on Earth will be able to. They've taken the most important person in Phil's life, the most deeply _good_ person he's ever known, and broken him, again and again. And even though he wasn't there, even though he didn't know Clint then, that's not something Phil can ever find it in himself to forgive.

For now, all he can do is try to show Clint how wrong they all were. To tell him, not just _I love you_ , but also _You are worthy_ and _You matter_ and _I will never let you be hurt again_.

Phil doesn't care how long it takes Clint to believe him. Clint is worth every second.


	18. Chapter 18

Phil doesn't even own casual clothing.

He has workout gear and suits, and that's all he ever wears. For the longest time, Clint thought that was all he owned. For Phil, 'casual' means undoing his top collar button, loosening his tie, or maybe, if he's really had a bad day, rolling up the sleeves of his shirt to his elbows. It's become almost a kind of signal for Clint – when Phil's shirtsleeves are rolled up, it's been rough going – and he knows how to respond, making dinner and eating it curled up on the couch with Phil, watching movies with no plot and not really paying any attention.

But it turns out Clint was wrong, and those aren't the only clothes Phil owns, because one day, Fury insists that Clint has to wear a suit to a meeting with highly-placed government officials. Clint, of course, owns nothing even vaguely resembling a suit, so Phil sends him to the closet to borrow one of his; it'll be a little long in the legs, a little tight across the shoulders, but it's not like there's a better option.

Looking around in the closet, Clint pushes aside one identical black suit too many, and that's how he finds Phil's old military uniform. It would be unremarkable, because it's an open secret that Coulson isn't your typical pencil-pusher, except that Clint looks closer and there's no name and no rank markings on the shirt, and over one sleeve there's the red arrowhead-and-dagger patch that designates Special Operations Command. There's only one reason a soldier would wear a patch like that without any other signifiers, and once again Clint realizes that there's an awful lot he'll never know about Phil. It looks like his partner's Delta Force career is just going to be another missing piece of the puzzle, and Clint wonders what happened to him during those lost years.

It's stupid, but when he emerges from the closet holding one of Phil's suits triumphantly aloft, he has to suppress the urge to salute the man he loves.


	19. Chapter 19

Clint's got a problem with the word 'enough.'

Not really a _problem_ , per se, it's just… well, he does a pretty good job of keeping it to himself, but after a while, Phil starts to notice it. The way his eyes skip over the performance analyses. The way he skilfully redirects the conversation around thin-ice areas. The way he flinches almost imperceptibly during their mission debriefs. _Fast enough. Strong enough. Close enough. Good enough._

Good enough. That's the one that makes the corners of Clint's mouth tighten, makes him swallow hard, makes him pause for a split second to regain his footing before straightening his posture, squaring his shoulders, and nodding expressionlessly. Phil's never given Clint any sign that he notices, but he knows that 'good enough' is not something Clint ever associates with himself.

Clint writes his field reports in code that only Phil can read. _Not fast enough_ becomes 'target was not acquired within exploitable timeframes.' _Not strong enough_ becomes 'strike force was outmatched and strategic retreat was required.' _Not close enough_ is 'not all artefacts were recovered without damage.' _Not good enough_ , well, that one's there in every other sentence, every time Clint spends more time describing what the other Avengers did than his own role, every time he says 'the objective was achieved' instead of saying _he_ achieved it, every time his handwriting grows jagged and hesitant because he's ashamed of having to put his actions to words.

It's worse when the missions haven't gone as planned, of course, but Clint doesn't even like to write about successes. They're just another way to measure _good enough_ , and the fact that he's gotten it right this time is, to him, no more than luck.

Everyone else just thinks he hates the paperwork, but Phil knows him better than that by now.

There's nothing he can do about it, nothing he can say to magically fix things, no words big enough to express the goodness Phil sees in Clint. No way to take a lifetime's worth of _not enough_ and prove all of it wrong, not without time, not without years to erase undeserved shame.

It's okay, though. Clint's with him now, and they have all the time in the world.


	20. Chapter 20

Phil's got a record player. An honest-to-God, belt drive tone-arm platter thing with a Lyra cartridge that consumes more of his monthly salary than is probably reasonable, and there's a neat stack of records organized by artist and genre and year that live in the bottom drawer of his S.H.I.E.L.D. standard-issue dresser.

Clint knows they're there and Phil's showed him how to use the record player (Clint's fingers on the tone-arm were startlingly gentle, his tentative grip on the edges of an early Electric Light Orchestra album more hesitant than Phil would have expected). But it still surprises Phil the first time he comes in to find Clint flopped back on the bed, eyes closed, listening to, of all things, _Swan Lake_. He'd have expected Clint to be more of a Led Zeppelin kind of guy, which, to be fair, he is; Phil walks in on Clint listening to Jimmy Page and Pete Townshend as often as Rachmaninoff and Holst. But he never quite loses that fascination with _Swan Lake_ , and Phil quickly loses count of the number of times he's found Clint in his quarters listening to the famous theme.

He doesn't tell anyone, of course, because Clint would _kill_ him. Figuratively, if not literally. But one day they're sitting in one of Tony Stark's many living rooms, waiting for the man himself to show up. Clint is fidgeting (not that he ever doesn't), and Phil is pretty sure they're being jerked around a little, but at least they're being jerked around while sitting on a comfortable couch with pleasant lighting and a waterfall and a piano and…

Well, now, that's a thought.

He sits down at the piano and Clint mumbles, trying not to look like he's paying as much attention as he is, "You know how to play that thing?"

Phil does, courtesy of the vicarious musical aspirations of an overenthusiastic mother, but instead of answering, he just spreads his fingers gently over the keys. Quick, soft touches to a triad of notes below middle C, bringing the right hand in on the crescendo, and he's playing the theme, Clint's theme, the one he spends so many evenings listening to, the one that Phil has secretly already bought another copy of because Clint is wearing down the grooves on the first one.

Clint doesn't make a sound, and when Phil looks over, he's sitting on the couch, eyes closed, head tipped back, listening the same way he does when he's alone in Phil's quarters and he thinks no one can see him. Which, in a weird way, is the best compliment Phil's not-particularly-noteworthy piano skills have ever received, because Clint is maybe not exactly a music critic, but he doesn't do anything at less than a hundred and ten percent, and so he gets _into_ the music when he listens. Like he's getting into _Phil's_ music right now. And at that thought, Phil has to stop, because God, he just wants to be over there right now, on the couch with Clint.

When he sits down, Clint opens one eye. "Gonna teach me how to do that?"

He's half-grinning, linking the fingers of one hand with Phil's, tucking his head against Phil's shoulder, and right now, Phil would agree to just about anything. "Mmm," he acquiesces into Clint's tousled hair. "Teach you anything you want."

Tony never does show up for their meeting.

Clint and Phil are totally okay with that.


	21. Chapter 21

S.H.I.E.L.D. headquarters is dark and empty, and Clint's pretty sure it's just in his head that his footsteps are echoing more than usual, but it's still kind of unnerving.

It's December 24th and everyone's gone home for the holidays. Clint thought there'd be at least a few people left over in a division as important as S.H.I.E.L.D., but no – even Bruce Banner has been let out on a pass for the night, visiting his girlfriend (with a heavy security detail).

Even his breathing sounds louder than ever.

He tries target practice for a while. It doesn't go down well. Normally, he enjoys the whip- _thud_ of arrows in the silence of the shooting range; it's why he practises at night so much. Today, though, it's just hollow, just another reminder that no one else is here. That everyone but Clint has somewhere else to be today.

The bow goes back into the armoury and Clint ends up in the fifth-floor atrium, watching snow fall on deserted sidewalks, streetlamps reflecting dimly off the window glass.

He's alone. He's used to being alone. It's no big deal.

Yeah, right.

"Merry fucking Christmas," he says softly to himself.

"Merry Christmas," comes a reply from the doorway, and Clint spins around so fast he nearly falls over. He's _alone_. Isn't he?

Coulson's standing in the doorway, a mug in each hand and kind of half-smiling at the look on Clint's face. "Didn't mean to scare you," he says, but Clint's pretty sure he never does anything he doesn't mean to do.

When Coulson offers him one of the mugs, though, he takes it. He's expecting coffee, but it's not, it's hot chocolate, and there's something in it that gives it a little bit of a kick.

He looks up at Coulson, who nods and turns to leave. "Merry Christmas, Agent Barton," he says again over his shoulder as he goes.

"Merry Christmas," Clint murmurs into his hot chocolate, but this time, he thinks maybe he means it.


	22. Chapter 22

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  **Note:** Telepathic Coulson AU at the request of [lindtbarton](http://lindtbarton.tumblr.com/).

Clint's never sure how Coulson manages to do it.

One minute he's sitting out in the sun on the roof, idly fingering his bowstring and contemplating the look on Tony Stark's face if he were to send an arrow through the socket wrench in Tony's hand and pin it neatly to the engine he's been trying to repair in the front yard – and the next, Coulson's fingers are closing around the arrow Clint has nocked, disarming him in a matter of seconds.

One minute, they're sparring and he's got the upper hand, which is a fairly rare occurrence because normally he spars with Steve and he's no match for super strength – and the next, Coulson has somehow anticipated his best surprise move, blocked it, and Clint's flat on his back on the floor, staring up at the slight grin on Coulson's normally expressionless face.

One minute, he's crouched in a tree near the far archery field, engaged in an open-air drill with the team, waiting to ambush an unsuspecting Bruce and take him down so that he can declare a total victory – and the next, Coulson is behind him, hands on his shoulders, holding him in place and whispering softly, "Don't even think about it."

One minute, he's turning in a field report and Coulson's hair is kind of a mess and his tie is loose and there's a faint bruise fading around his left eye because he's obviously been engaged in some kind of hand-to-hand combat, and Clint can't help but picture it briefly and the thought flashes through his mind that, actually, _damn_ , Coulson is not bad-looking at all when he's not playing the stuffed-shirt pencil-pusher – and the next, Coulson has caught his eye and there's that knowing grin again and Clint can feel the flush rising up in his cheeks, which is stupid because of _course_ Coulson has no idea what he's just been thinking, but sometimes Clint could _swear_ the man can read minds.

And then somehow he can't _stop_ picturing it and it's getting to the point where he actually waits for Coulson to turn off his office lights and leave for the night before stuffing his reports under the door because the _look_ Coulson gives him every time he goes in, it's like he just sees straight through Clint and right into his brain. So he waits until the office goes dark before turning in his paperwork, only one minute, he's shoving a stack of roughly-scrawled summaries into the crack between the carpet and the door – and the next, the door is open and he's looking sheepishly up at Coulson because the bastard was _in there waiting for him_ , and then Coulson beckons him inside and shuts the door behind him and yeah, Clint's pretty sure Coulson knows _exactly_ what's been going through his head for the past few days.

He has no idea _how_ he knows, but actually, given what Coulson is doing with the knowledge, that's really not a major concern for him right now. And then his brain goes, _stop thinking, Barton, goddammit_ , and Coulson says, "Stop thinking, Barton, goddammit," and that's pretty much the end of rational thought for Clint, and Coulson seems to know it, too, because he whispers, "That's better," and goes back to calmly destroying their strictly professional working relationship.


	23. Chapter 23

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  **Note:** Art by [Tigs](http://tgda.tumblr.com/).

[ ](http://tgda.tumblr.com/)  


Phil and Clint don't shower together often during the week.

This is mainly because Clint sleeps in until five minutes before their morning briefings, stubbornly refusing to let convenience and common sense intrude on his sleeping habits. Phil, on the other hand, is up before the sun, getting work done and making coffee and being annoyingly cheery and efficient. Phil is all about efficiency in the mornings, and having a sleepy, not-yet-caffeinated Clint in the shower with him is exactly the opposite.

Today is different, though.

Today, Clint was already awake when Phil's alarm went off, curled over on his side and breathing hard, and when Phil's hand touched his shoulder gently, he flinched so hard he nearly went over the edge of the bed.

 _Hey_ , Phil said to him, _hey_ , and the wild look in Clint's eyes when he rolled over to face him was heartbreaking.

 _It's okay_ , he said. _You're okay. Come back to me._

One bowstring-calloused hand reached out and twisted itself into the worn fabric of Phil's T-shirt; the other threaded its way through Phil's fingers, and Phil pulled him in close, letting the trembling subside and the taut knots of Clint's muscles loosen just a little.

 _Nightmare?_ Phil asked. It wasn't the first time, and it wasn't as though he hadn't read Clint's file; the parts that were cleared for his access were nightmare fuel enough for one man facing them alone, and he wasn't sure he wanted to know about the parts that weren't open to him.

 _It's fine_ , was all Clint would say, but Phil knows that _fine_ is grinning and wisecracking and grumbling at Phil for waking him up at this hour. This stoic silence is anything but.

So they're in the shower together this morning and Phil isn't even trying for efficiency. He's letting the hot water sluice the cold sweat off Clint's skin, letting the steam build up so that they don't have to make eye contact, wrapping his arms around Clint under the water and just holding him, just being there, just grounding him in the here and the now and the fact that wherever he was a few minutes ago, he's with Phil now and he's safe, he'll always be safe.

It's not a promise Phil normally makes. He knows it's likely that he won't be able to keep it. Clint knows it, too, but that doesn't matter right now. What matters is that Phil is here to make the promise, that he's here to wrap Clint in a towel and ruffle the droplets from his hair, that he presses a kiss to Clint's forehead and tells him to go back to bed and get some sleep. What matters is that when he sees the flash of fear behind Clint's eyes, for just one morning, Phil abandons coffee and requisition forms and neatly-pressed suit jackets to slide back between the sheets with Clint so that, even now, he doesn't have to be alone.


	24. Chapter 24

Clint is good for Phil's sleeping patterns.

That was unexpected. Clint never sleeps unless he's forced to, although once he's down he's near-impossible to get back up. Phil thought he'd spend his evenings fetching Clint from the shooting range and putting away his bow; he thought he'd spend his mornings vainly trying to shake Clint awake in time to shower, dress and make it to the morning briefings before Fury noticed anything amiss. Instead, though, it wasn't long after they began… _this_ , whatever it is… that Clint began appearing in Phil's office late at night, giving him disapproving looks and distracting him from his paperwork.

Even _you_ need sleep, Clint points out, calmly stripping the spring and pocket clip out of a ballpoint pen.

So do you, Phil says, and I've got work to do.

I'll wait, says Clint, and fires the stripped-down pen barrel into the wall, where it stabs, quivering softly, directly into the middle of a crudely-drawn target.

Phil sighs and runs his fingers through his hair.

He starts bringing his paperwork into the bedroom at night, so that maybe Clint will at least be _near_ the bed. Clint paces the room, clearly torn between wanting to be down at the range and wanting to be close to Phil, and insists that he isn't tired. Phil feels seven years old again, with his mother telling him it doesn't matter how tired he is or isn't, bedtime means he's lying down and quiet. Clint has been seven years old for the past thirty years; probably, he'll be seven years old forever.

Eventually, they figure it out. Phil sits on the bed, a clipboard carefully balanced on one knee as he signs statements and fills out forms and gets ink all over the cuff of his shirt. Clint curls around him like an overgrown cat, head pillowed on Phil's other knee and getting in the way of the clipboard. Sometimes, they sit like that for hours, until Phil finishes and puts the forms away and Clint stretches across the mattress to wrap Phil in his arms. Sometimes, Clint falls asleep there and Phil can hardly bring himself to move when his work is done for the night, and maybe once or twice he's fallen asleep sitting up slumped over Clint and both of them have woken up in the morning sore and stiff-necked, with rueful grins and swearing to one another that they're never going to do that again. But they always fall asleep _somehow_ , and that's better than either of them was doing before.

Clint ruins Phil's pens and wrinkles his suits and puts clusters of tiny holes into his office walls – but he also takes the pens out of Phil's hands when he's too tired to think; he slides Phil's suit jackets gently off his shoulders and hangs them up over the back of a chair, loosening the buttons of his shirt and unbuckling his belt; he's warm and solid against Phil's back as he works and gentle when they sleep. Phil's never known anyone quite like Clint.

But it works.

Clint is good for Phil's sleeping patterns.

Clint is good for Phil.


	25. Chapter 25

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  **Spoiler alert:** references to major events in _Hawkeye: Blindspot_.

Phil is on assignment in Russia, clearing away the last few traces of the Dark Ocean Society there, when he doesn't hear about Clint's diagnosis.

He's still in Russia when he doesn't hear that Clint has left headquarters, taken down Captain America in a fight, and gone off on his own, vigilante-style, to face some of his oldest demons.

The job takes longer than expected, and he's _still_ in Russia when he doesn't hear about Clint's total loss of vision, the battle he goes into _literally_ blind, the last-chance bone marrow transplant they use to try to save him…

He comes home to a quieter Clint than he is used to seeing, one with fewer flippant remarks and more time spent alone on the shooting range, one who sometimes stops what he's doing for a moment in the evenings when they're alone in their room and Phil has to bring him back with a hand on his shoulder and it takes Clint a minute to shake the distant look in his eyes and refocus on Phil, warm and strong and standing there in front of him, a worried frown creasing his forehead.

After a day or two of this, Phil corners Tony in the kitchen and asks what happened while he was away. He hasn't seen any incident reports and there's no way in hell Clint will give up any information, so when Tony realizes Phil doesn't know _anything_ , a look of horror crosses his face and he pulls Phil into his office, closes the door, and explains about the blindness they thought was incurable, the brother who tried to kill Clint while he was incapacitated, the way Clint left the Avengers because he thought no one could help him.

About five seconds into Tony's explanation, Phil wants to punch someone. About five minutes in, he wants to kill someone. By the time Tony's done talking, Phil doesn't know what he wants to do, only that he's pretty sure it's forbidden by national, international and military law.

That night, when Clint comes in from target practice hours later than he usually does, Phil stands between him and the door and wrings the story out of him in his own words, all the details Tony left out or didn't know, all the repressed memories the blow to the head brought back. Clint tries to stay close-mouthed, but that's not happening, no _way_ is that happening, and so he gives up and tells Phil everything. He talks in a flat monotone, never breaking, delivering the words like they're his latest field report. Another man might hesitate, or get angry, or cry; Clint does none of those things, but Phil pulls him into his arms without a word and holds him anyway, just holds him like he's never going to let go, and they fall asleep that way, sitting on the floor with Phil's back against the door and Clint's head tucked against his shoulder.

In the morning, they're both stiff and painful, and the team exchange knowing looks at their briefing. But Clint's wisecracking now and joining in with group training sessions and there's _life_ in his eyes again, and that's something that's worth any price at all to Phil.


	26. Chapter 26

Sometimes, it's too much for Clint to handle.

Usually, he's pretty good. He cracks jokes, flashes grins, breaks out his trademark sarcasm at a level even Tony has a hard time matching. They know that he's the guy who makes them laugh, and also that he's the guy who can piss off Fury like no one's business. They know that he's the guy who's got their backs in the field, and also that he's the guy most likely to pull a ridiculous prank like making Tony's bed with Captain America sheets or reprogramming his alarm clock to wake him up to the tune of "Star Spangled Man."

That's what he is; that's the place he's carved out for himself in this group, this Avengers thing he's somehow become a part of. He's ordinary but funny; not as good as the rest of them, but still allowed to sit in on the edge; not as well-known or as well-liked as the others, but still a member of the team, a partner, a _friend_.

 _Friend_ is the part that overwhelms him sometimes, because it's not something he was expecting. He's given up on having people like him; the tone he takes to protect himself is not exactly one that's ideal for making connections. These guys don't seem to have quite gotten the message, though, and they still laugh at his jokes, congratulate him on especially tough shots, and invite him into their circle of conspiracy when they plan things.

It's too much. It's all too much.

He retreats, on those days, to his quarters, sits tucked between the bed and the wall with the hood of his sweatshirt pulled up over his head, hiding his eyes. He sits there, where it's quiet and no one can startle him, and _breathes_ , because sometimes when he's surrounded by so many well-intentioned friends, he forgets how.

Sometimes he just needs to be alone so that his lungs can find the room to expand.

He worries that he's ungrateful; that life, in some great cosmic, karmic prank on him, will come back and take all of this away because he doesn't cope very well with it and maybe there's someone else out there who would be a better choice. But he's trying, he tells himself, he's _trying_ and he's learning and he's getting better at the whole _friends_ thing, and when he thinks about it for too long, it's like he's trying to convince the universe that he deserves this after all, and so he stops, thinks about something else, and breathes.

They used to follow him when he hid in his room, knock on his door and ask if he was okay, if he wanted to do something with them, if he was planning to have dinner, anything. He appreciated their concern, he really did, but he didn't know how he could possibly manage to send a clearer message: _I can't handle this right now_.

In the end, he didn't need to make it any clearer. Someone else stepped in, someone else always steps in, quietly redirecting them elsewhere, waiting and then knocking on the door.

Phil knows what he needs, there in the quiet spaces where he goes when it's too much. He slots himself in beside Clint, arms gentle around him, words unnecessary, and just holds on until Clint finds his way back.

And when he does, Phil is there waiting for him.

With Phil, there's not much Clint can't handle.


	27. Chapter 27

Sometimes, Clint just says things to Phil, out of the blue. Phil has discovered that that's how he tends to try to say the important things, because he can't handle the pressure of a serious discussion with build-up and expectations and all that. Instead, he waits until they're hanging out of a helicopter by their fingernails, or running out of air in a locked room inside a Hydra cell block, or five minutes late to morning briefing, which to Phil is about as bad as things can get.

This time, they're falling asleep, most of the way there already in the darkness of Phil's room. Phil is lying loose and relaxed against his pillows; Clint is sprawled over the entire bed, tucked under Phil's arm and breathing softly so that the tiny hairs ruffle in the warm night air. Phil's eyes are sliding shut when Clint rolls over a little and goes,

"… mmmphil?"

With effort, he comes back to wakefulness and settles his arm more comfortably around Clint. "Yeah?"

"You know why I love you?"

Phil's alert in no time, his breath catching in his throat. This is important, because Clint has actually said it, _I love you_. And for all that Clint is mouthy and quick to joke around, he's always had a lot of trouble with words that mean anything real. Those words are rare and halting from him, and Phil's learnt by now to make space for Clint when he wants to say them, do whatever he can to make Clint feel like it's okay.

"You never make me feel like the punchline."

Phil pauses.

"The… what?"

"You know that guy in action movies whose only job is to be the comic relief?"

They pretend that Phil is too high-brow for action movies, but not when they're alone in bed together. "Yeah. I do."

"That guy. It scares me sometimes," Clint says carefully, and Phil is waiting because he doesn't usually manage this much openness at once. "It scares me, you know? Like, when all of this was new, I get it, it helped to have a guy who knew his way around a little. But everyone's working as a team now, and I kind of… I mean, what am I doing there?"

"You're the best marksman S.H.I.E.L.D. has ever seen."

"Yeah, but what does that mean, really? Look around you, Phil; if S.H.I.E.L.D. needed marksmen, there'd be more of us. That's what I mean – _that guy_."

Phil pulls him close, holds onto him. Clint will never be _that guy_ , at least not to Phil, but he can understand the feeling.

"You never make me feel like the bit part," he says softly.

Clint pulls away to look at him. "The bit part?"

"I'm not even on the team," Phil tells him. "I just come in afterward and hand out waiver forms."

"That's not true."

"It is to them," he says. "That's why I have you."

Clint ducks in, kisses him gently, and Phil's a little surprised because he doesn't know what's going through Clint's head right now at all.

"You're not the bit part," Clint says. "You're the breakout character. Hell, you're the _director_."

"Don't tell Fury," says Phil, but there's a sleepy smile on his face that has very little to do with the look on Fury's face if they ever said that to him, and everything to do with the way Clint curls into him and tucks his head against Phil's shoulder so that his words are muffled when he speaks.

"I don't care what they think," Clint says against warm skin, and Phil can feel the words hum through him, comforting. "I got you now." He brushes soft kisses against the mark on Phil's shoulder, into the crook of his neck, along the line of his jaw.

Phil lets his fingers furrow through Clint's hair, trace down over the short strands at the back of his neck, settle wrapped around him where there's no way he can ever lose his grip. "I've got you, too," he says, "punchline or no."

"You should know by now," Clint murmurs, half-asleep again already. "I always have a punchline."


	28. Chapter 28

Of all of the Avengers, Tony is the one second-most likely to have 'issues with authority' stamped on his documents.

It's why he's sitting in the rec room now, sprawled out across the comfortably-overstuffed couch and complaining at length about Agent Coulson.

Of all of the Avengers, Clint is the only one more likely than Tony to have 'issues with authority' stamped on his documents.

That's why it's Clint that Tony is complaining to, perched on the arm of the couch with a video game controller in one hand and paying no attention to the screen. Tony's just finished a diatribe on paperwork and how he employs hundreds of people to do that for him and how it makes no sense whatsoever for Coulson to expect him to do his own; he's looking at Clint expectantly now, waiting for agreement, some kind of wisecrack, something.

"He saved my life. I ever tell you about that?" is what Clint says instead.

Tony shakes his head.

"We were in Russia," Clint continues. "He took a bullet for me. Right in the shoulder."

The other Avengers, the ones who didn't know Coulson before, don't spend much time thinking about the fact that he _is_ a field agent, that he _has_ been on missions, that he's even faced down death the same way they do every day. He just doesn't talk much about it.

"You know how long we'd known each other then?" Clint says, almost conversationally.

Tony shakes his head again.

"Sixteen hours. And he stepped in front of a bullet for me."

Tony looks thoughtful.

"Took me eleven different hospitals in three states to track him down. S.H.I.E.L.D. didn't make it easy."

"They didn't want you to find him?"

"It was supposed to be a one-off partnership. I didn't even know his real name."

"So why'd you go after him?"

Clint stares unblinkingly at Tony for a moment, then shrugs. He's not meeting Tony's eyes when he says, "Guess I'm not so great with following orders."

He can tell that Tony is about to call him out on it, about to make him give a real answer, but then the alarm sounds and Clint seizes on it as an excuse, is on his feet and halfway down the corridor before Tony is even off the couch.

That evening in their quarters, sitting on the bed and patching up a jagged gash in Clint's left bicep, Phil says, "Thanks for sticking up for me."

"You listened in on my conversations again."

"I monitored the Avengers mansion security feeds. It's part of my job description."

"Dammit, Phil."

"Why _did_ you come after me?" Phil asks him softly. He's not looking for reassurance or anything like it. They know what they are to one another. He just genuinely doesn't know the answer.

Clint rolls over, away onto the bed, and mutters his reply into the sheets, where he can pretend he didn't mean for Phil to hear it. They both know better, but this is how they are. Phil hears it anyway, of course.

"I'd follow you anywhere."


	29. Chapter 29

Clint is a master of his trade, but he aspires to be a jack of many.

Not even Fury can deny that Clint is unquestionably the best man for his job. Sure, he might threaten Clint with replacement daily, usually after a spate of workplace complaints or a particularly trying morning briefing, but the truth is that any replacement would be a poor substitute at best.

Of course, some might argue that, as far as key team members go, 'the guy with the good aim' isn't exactly top of the list in the first place. That's why Clint keeps trying to add skills to his arsenal – martial arts he picks up everywhere, boxing from Happy and Steve, a brief liaison with Pym particles, even lock-picking. He's not bad at any of them (especially the last, as Phil learns to his chagrin upon unsuspecting entry into his supposedly-empty office one morning), but he isn't great, either.

"You don't need to keep trying to make yourself irreplaceable," Phil tells him on the morning of the lock-picking incident. "You already are. Believe me, everyone's already checked for loopholes."

Clint just gives him a skeptical look because _Phil_ , Phil is a fine one to talk. Phil is a jack of every single trade, and a master of most of them as well. He can best Clint in a fair fight easily, not that their 'fights' are ever exactly 'fair.' He can't out-shoot Clint, obviously, but under standard testing conditions, they both get perfect scores. He hasn't had Pym particles and he doesn't pick locks, but he takes full advantage of the tools around him (there was a thing with flour once; Phil hasn't explained and Clint hasn't asked), so the bad guys are defeated and the doors opened everywhere Phil goes anyway.

Of course _Phil_ is indispensable. He can do everything.

Clint grins and promises to stop practising his newly-acquired skills on Phil.

Phil figures that's about all he's going to get and sends Clint off for target practice so that he can get started on the day's paperwork.

He may be a jack of all trades, but he is certainly a master of _that_.


	30. Chapter 30

There are some questions you simply do not ask a man like Phil Coulson. _How many people have you killed?_ is at the top of that list.

"Come on, how many?"

Phil frowns, gaze darting around the bar in search of something, anything, to pull him out of this conversation. It's not one he wants to have – it's not one he ever imagined he would need to have – and his shoulders are tense, fists clenched in his suit jacket pockets, biting down hard enough on his lower lip that he can taste the blood just a little.

He swallows. There's been enough blood for one lifetime already.

He's about to draw breath and try to formulate some kind of excuse for leaving (and it's pretty damn good that he still thinks he can manage to walk away at all), but before he can sort the tangle of thoughts in his head into coherent words, there's a warm presence at his elbow, a hand at his back, a voice in the sticky, uncomfortable quiet that has fallen in the absence of his answer.

"Phil, can you come give me a hand over here?"

He turns, nods wordlessly, and lets Clint shepherd him away from the girls in the corner; as he puts distance between them, he can feel his muscles unlocking, his breath returning to normal as the tightness in his chest yields a little.

When he is completely sure he has control over his voice, he says, "Thanks." He's glad to hear it comes out as firmly as he'd intended.

Clint shrugs. "Didn't hear what they said, but I don't think I wanted to, did I?"

Phil shakes his head. He's glad no one else had to hear that, glad Clint doesn't know what it was that made him freeze up, left him anything other than the picture of bureaucratic efficiency he's tried so hard to cultivate. The rest of that stuff, he's left it behind him. It isn't a part of him anymore (except that it is, it always will be, but he tries to move on anyway).

He's glad Clint doesn't know, but he thinks that if he could handle anyone's knowing, it would be Clint.

"C'mon," says Clint, "I'll buy you a beer."

"That's fraternization, Agent Barton."

"That's not what you said last night," Clint shoots back with a grin, and Phil manages a faint echo of it in response.

Despite everything, he's glad he came out with the Avengers tonight. He's glad he took the evening off from paperwork. He's glad that Clint is here, and glad that the archer knows him well enough to read the signs of his discomfort even from across the room (though when that happened, when they reached that point of knowing one another, Phil cannot fathom).

Clint never asks questions that Phil can't answer. He's glad of that, too.

He's glad for a lot of things, but most of all, that no matter how many people there are like that girl in the corner, in the end, he always has Clint.


	31. Chapter 31

It's a little awkward when they're in his quarters, sitting on the edge of the bed, and he's pulling off one shoe, then the other, one sock, then the other, wondering how long he can draw this out before he's removed all the articles of clothing he's willing to lose and has to explain why he's not going to take off anything else.

It's a little less awkward when Clint throws himself back on the bed, still wearing his shorts and T-shirt, and looks up at him wordlessly out of wide, anxious eyes like he's waiting for Phil to ask him the same questions.

Phil drops his tie neatly on top of his pile of folded clothes, lies back still half-dressed, and pulls Clint into his arms, and then it's not awkward at all.

It's a little awkward when they're in Petrozavodsk and there's an artificial, shrieking wail like a Fourth of July firework all grown up, and then a bang, and when the shiver dies down and the air carries sound again, he's curled behind the bed in an instinctive duck-and-cover, as though that would help at all if they were really being bombed.

It's a little less awkward when Clint reaches out to him with shaking fingers, lips pressed together tight and bloodless. When he makes contact with Phil's shoulder, just barely brushing against the fabric of his shirt, he whispers, _fuck_ , and Phil knows he isn't the only one whose years have left him a special kind of damaged.

They sit together in the space between the bed and the wall, not making eye contact, and don't sleep; in the morning, they buy shashlik and pirozhki from a street vendor for breakfast, and in the end it's not awkward at all.

It's a little awkward when he wakes up in the middle of the night and he's alone, because Clint is on a mission in Aguachica. Without him, Phil has to count in his head to slow his breathing, drag the back of one hand over his forehead to wipe away cold sweat, check carefully under his pillow to feel the cool, hard edge of metal he keeps hidden there.

It's a little less awkward when he's on a secure line with Clint, collecting a field report, and Clint says softly, _had a dream last night_ , and Phil says, _yeah, me too_. They keep it strictly business for the rest of the call, but when Clint signs off, he says, _I miss you_ , then lets the line go dead without waiting for an answer.

He's home within the week, mission successful, commendation on his record next to a dozen others he won't admit to, and they wait until they are alone before they hesitate, and hesitate, and when they move past hesitation into _doing_ , kissing with Phil's hands gentle on Clint's shoulders and no space left between them, it's not awkward at all.


	32. Chapter 32

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  **Note:** In response to a question about Clint and his ceiling-duct habits.

When Sitwell asks the question, everyone goes quiet.

The thing is, they don't really talk about it. Well, Director Fury does (usually along the lines of "goddammit, Barton, if one more junior agent cites you as a reason for workplace stress," followed by Clint's arguing that if an ally in the ductwork is too stressful for them, they're not really suited to S.H.I.E.L.D. anyway, are they?), but no one else ever addresses the issue directly.

Not until Sitwell, anyway. And he does it in the monthly all-departments mandatory meeting, so there's no evading the question, no looking vaguely into the distance and pretending it wasn't asked at all.

Coulson says, "It's not a problem, sir," to Bridge, the second-highest-ranking officer in attendance (after Fury, who has his own opinions on the matter).

Bridge says, "We have agents crawling around in the ductwork?"

"It's a field skill," explains Coulson, and maybe it is and maybe it isn't, but he's a master of spinning things to suit the tastes of higher-ups, and this is one he's had a lot of practice spinning. "Agent Barton is a sniper and an infiltrator. He spends a lot of time in scenarios where these kinds of techniques can be vital."

"How come I never knew about this?"

"Because," and here Coulson can allow himself to be a little bit pleased, "Agent Barton is very good at his job."

After the meeting, Coulson collars Sitwell and invites him into his office for a chat. "What happens in the Avengers Initiative," he says, and lets the rest of his sentence remain as implication. "We don't go around telling people about Dr. Banner's… special skills, either, or the fact that we have a Norse god and the Six Million Dollar Man stashed away in our facilities. Some things are on a need-to-know basis."

Sitwell nods, flushing bright red (anyone could tell you he's S.H.I.E.L.D.'s most devoted employee, and such a stickler for the rules that it's a little bit hilarious to see what happens when he inadvertently puts a foot wrong), and stammers an apology as he exits Coulson's office. Coulson thinks maybe he should point out that this particular rule is unwritten and informal only, but it's too much fun watching him, and Coulson has few enough pleasures at work that he'll take them where they're offered up to him.

Speaking of workplace pleasures, he leans back in his old, creaking office chair and fixes his gaze on one of the drop tiles almost directly above his desk.

"You can come down now, Barton."

"I'm practising my field skills."

"Very funny. You realize those meetings are mandatory."

"I was there. There's no rule that says I have to be sitting in a chair, right?"

"Don't make me write one," Coulson sighs, changing the absentee marker on Clint's file to 'in attendance.'

"You wouldn't. I spend a lot of time in scenarios where these kinds of techniques can be vital."

"I'm writing it as we speak," says Coulson, and he actually is, though putting it through is an idle threat and far more paperwork than he's willing to take on for the sake of a joke.

There's a scuffling in the ceiling tiles and then a puff of dust as Clint lands on both feet in the middle of the room. "Buzzkill," he mutters, but comes around the edge of the desk anyway and steals a kiss, and then another.

"We're at work, Clint," Coulson says warningly.

"Yeah, well," says Clint. "What happens in the Avengers Initiative."


	33. Chapter 33

"The thing about brains – " he coughs out.

"Stop talking, Barton," says Phil, who has enough to focus on already and doesn't need Clint's waxing philosophical on him.

" – the thing about brains," Clint continues as if he hasn't spoken (and this, at least, is not at all out of the ordinary), "is that they have – they have this, like, kill switch, right – "

He coughs again; this time there's blood, but at this point that hardly matters anymore.

"I thought I told you to stop talking," Phil says mildly, not making eye contact because he's too focused on what his hands are (ineffectively) doing.

"Like, if you're bleeding – " he says like it's a hypothetical, like the evidence isn't spreading across the front of Phil's (new) shirt, like it isn't staining the ground around them and sticking Phil's fingers to each other and colouring the pavement sickly crimson-copper tones – "then it's like you don't have – personal problems any more, you know? Brain's got – priorities."

"Apparently, not yours."

"No, I – "

He breaks off with a gasp as Phil does something he can't see, and then there's more blood (how much more does he have to lose, anyway? there can't be that much left in him) that spatters across Phil's wrists until he manages to pull off his tie (out of bandages, how can they be out of bandages, this is the Avengers they're talking about, did no one packing the first-aid kits remember how much time they spend bleeding out onto the street?) and use it as a tourniquet.

"I think that's all of them."

"See, I don't need to – prioritize. You do it – for me."

"Barton, save your goddamn breath."

"Priorities," is all Clint says; it comes out raw and hoarse, and then he's wrenching himself up off the ground (blood, all over Phil's hands, jesus fuck, how can he still be bleeding) and one shaking hand is caught in Phil's collar and Clint is almost pressing their lips together, except that his strength runs out before he gets there and it's just a huff of breath across Phil's skin before Clint falls back to the pavement and Phil's barely fast enough to catch him before his head hits.

"… thing about brains…" he breathes out, and there are heavy footfalls behind Phil, people running, med techs finally on-site, he can let go, hand Clint over to them, go back to things that are actually in his job description, things that he knows how to handle, because God knows, Clint is not something Phil will ever know how to handle.

But first.

There are other people's hands on Clint now, fresh bandages that aren't soaked through and struggling to hold the torn shreds of him together, someone's trying to loosen Clint's arm from where it's locked around Phil so that they can start fluid resuscitation, but first.

Phil leans forward, fingertips brushing Clint's jaw to tilt his head up so that they can make eye contact, and it occurs to him that Clint has finally stopped talking.

"Priorities, Barton," he says, and lets their lips touch gently for a moment.


End file.
